'Truth spoken without moderation reverses itself'
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Sunday, September 4, 2016

Majid Rafizadeh - Why Iran needs an ‘enemy’ to survive

In his latest
speeches, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has been emphasizing on
how the Islamic Republic should focus on confronting and resisting its
“enemies” and how Iranian leaders should not trust Iran’s enemies under any
circumstances.

Since the
establishment of the Islamic Republic in 1979, Tehran’s message has been
consistent that the Islamic Republic faces existential threats and enemies.
Iran’s state-owned media outlets have been spreading the same message and
narrative. For Iran, the US and
Israel have been consistently considered as major enemies, while Iranian
leaders have also added other regional nations their list of enemies in various
periods. But why does the Islamic Republic have to constantly remind its
population of the “enemies”?

A narrative to
survive: The long-standing
Iranian leaders’ narrative that Iran faces enemies has been consistently
manifesting itself in Friday prayers, speeches that Iran’s Supreme Leader,
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei delivers on a regular basis, as well as the general of
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), mottos of the state’s semi-militia
group Basij, and so on. Coining labels for the enemy such as the “Great Satan”
has also been engraved in the political ideology of the system.

Children are taught
from an early age, through the educational system and books, about these
dangerous “enemies”. The state’s media outlets persistently reiterate who the
“enemies” are, why they are the enemies and generally bashing them. As Mina, an Iran-based
political scientist pointed out “almost 90 percent of Iran’s news is focused on
warning the people about the regional and global enemies, bashing the US,
Israel or other states in the region such as Saudi Arabia, and the rest of the
news is about spreading Shiite theology, mourning the death of Shiite leaders,
showing that the Shiite are the victims, and showing how Iran is the only good
country in the region”.

In other words, by
looking at Iran’s policies since 1979, one can observe that Iran has
methodically, systematically, and effectively used the concept of “enemy”. By showing that the
enemy is the oppressor, Iran describes itself as the oppressed which gives
immunity to the ruling clerics in order to commit any acts for “self-defense”

Fearmongering: Having powerful
“enemies” serves very well as a social, political, strategic and economic
scapegoat for Iranian leaders. Without an “enemy” how can the Iranian leader
justify cracking down on opposition? Without the existential “enemy”, how can
Khamenei and the IRGC explain the large military budget? Without the “enemies”,
how can Iranian leaders distract attention from the accumulation of wealth at
the top and the large amount of poverty in Iran?

Without the “enemy”
how can General Qassem Soleimani and Khamenei explain the intervention in
Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen, Bahrain? Without these enemies, who will the
Iranian leaders blame for the fact that over half of Iran’s population are
surviving under poverty line? With no “enemy”, how can Iranian leaders maintain
the core of their revolutionary principles and the Islamic character of the
state?

If there is no
“enemy”, how will Iranian leaders take attention away from the day-to-day
difficulties that Iranians face? Without the “enemies”, from which social base
would Khamenei obtain his legitimacy? Without the “enemies”, how can the IRGC
brutally crack down on domestic oppositions and turn its military institution
into a regional empire? Iran’s military budget
continues to increase, although Iran has not been attacked by any state or
non-state actor in the last three decades.

Creating enemies: The most important
reason lies in the notion that Iranian leaders have methodically and
systematically used the “enemies” as a scapegoat and a tool to more easily
justify a crackdown on any opposition domestically.

In the first few years
after the revolution, Iran consolidated its power by labeling the opposition as
the enemies (Americans, Israelis or Iraqis), conspirators and traitors. This
gave the state the legal platform to eliminate the opposition. This approach
has continued until the present.

From the military
perspective having an enemy has given the top gilded circle of Iranian leaders
the excuse to accumulate wealth through utilizing most of the budget, revenues,
the nation’s resources and wealth. Not only the wealth gets accumulated at the
top, but also the increasing power and capacity of Iran’s military will ensure
that the ruling leaders can suppress the opposition domestically, pursue
Tehran’s regional hegemonic ambitions, and deter any possibility of foreign
intervention that might endanger the government’s hold on power.

Authoritarian and
paranoid: Having an “enemy” for
Iranian clerics is a powerful tool to unify the population, create the “other”,
divide and rule, and more easily control the population by identifying the
“deviants” from the supporters of the religious rule in the country.

Having a powerful
“enemy” is a method to rule by invoking nationalistic sentiments through
instigating hatred and fear. The most prominent example of application of this
method in the modern history would be the Nazi Party. However, the Islamic
Republic not only invokes the nationalistic sentiments but also the
revolutionary ones. This creates a powerful force behind the government.

This method is much
easier than unifying people and galvanizing support by focusing on resolving
domestic issues. When you have an “enemy”, people across the political spectrum
support the government. It creates blind patriotism.

The Islamic Republic
can better define its ideological political identity by positioning itself on
the good side and projecting the enemy as barbarian, demonic, malicious, and
immoral. By showing that the enemy is the oppressor, Iran describes itself as
the oppressed which gives immunity to the ruling clerics in order to commit any
acts for “self-defense”.

The Islamic Republic
is also a religious revolutionary state. Two of its core values are standing
against the “enemy” and viewing things from the prism of being either on the
side of evil or the benevolent. A religious revolutionary state can either turn
into a force of goodness or it can become a paranoid state.

The Islamic Republic
is a paranoid and religious revolutionary state that analyzes things in a
binary paradigm: If you agree with their ideology, you are good (you can be a
communist, capitalist, or theocrat). If you disagree with them on anything, you
are not only an enemy but you need to be wiped out and suppressed (even if you
are one of the founding members of the government). For this kind of
government, there is no middle ground, there is no compromise.

Finally, the “enemy”
can also be a force for unifying supporters and creating loyalty as a result of
the imaginary threat. No matter how much Iran’s “enemies” try, the country’s
leaders will not change its policies towards them. The Islamic republic’s
ruling clerics cannot afford not to have such outstanding “enemies”. If Iran
does not have an enemy, it will have to create one to survive.
______________________________Dr. Majid Rafizadeh, an Iranian-American political scientist and Harvard
University scholar, is president of the International American Council.
Rafizadeh serves on the board of Harvard International Review at Harvard
University. Rafizadeh served as a senior fellow at Nonviolence International Organization
based in Washington DC.